This week on the Friday Roundtable, our panelists discuss the people, the experiences and the adversity that helped shape them personally and professionally.

LEARN MORE ABOUT BUILDING A CAREER:

• Katty Kay's career setback
About seven years ago, I was anchoring a BBC news program and somebody else was brought in to do it. I had that moment of thinking, "My God, I'm a complete failure. I'll never work again." Then you get up the next day and realize the sky hasn't fallen and your family still loves you — and then about six months later somebody offers you something just as interesting, if not more interesting, and you make the best of it. (Washingtonian)

• The advice that inspired J.W. "Bill" Marriott Jr.
My father told me that if I wanted to be successful, I had to work. He told me that every day from the time I was six years old. He had a favorite point he liked to make about trees: The smaller the tree, the harder it had to fight for sun and light, but if it worked hard it got tall and strong. (Washingtonian)

• Trista Harris on the challenges of the nonprofit world
For someone who has dedicated her entire professional life to service of others, Harris knows there are many others doing the same thing with their lives, and she knows there is also a potential for burnout — especially for those on the front lines. The graduate of Howard University in Washington, D.C., and the University of Minnesota's Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs said she hopes in her new role she can help to ease the strain on many smaller nonprofits.

"So many nonprofits are short staffed," said Harris. "These individuals are in a place where the system was already broken before they got there. It's like having a house with a leaky roof. When water is leaking we get a bucket so the water doesn't leak on the floor, but the real hard work is to get up there and fix the roof, and that's what we've got to start doing." (Insight News)